A Memoir of My Execution, by Lucky Prescott Halpert
by Ameniar7
Summary: After Javier is shot accidentally by Harlan Grayson, Lucky is accused of Grayson's murder and sentenced to hang. This is the story of her execution and her survival in her own words.


I was a child of the frontier. I was born in Miradero, California in 1883. My mother was a Mexican circus performer who died when I was very young; I only have spotty memories of her, but she apparently exerted a great influence on me as I inherited her talent for equine acrobatics. My Father was an Anglo frontiersman-turned businessman, who was born to wealth and privilege. His Father owned JP and Sons Railroad; one of the earliest railroad businesses, dating almost to the invention of rail travel in the United States itself.

My Father tried desperately to escape his privileged life. In 1863, he lied about his age (he was only 14 years old) and enlisted in the Federal Army; he first saw action at Gettysburg and almost every major engagement of the Army of the Potomac thereafter. After the war, he escaped to the frontier and found work as a Horse Wrangler in Southern California. He met and fell in love with my mother when _El Circo Dos Grillos_ visited Miradero, and the two of them married after knowing each other for only three weeks.

When I was four years old, after my mother died, my father and I moved to Kansas City, Missouri, where he took over my Grandfather's Railroad Firm. This was 1887, and while the great railroad barons had moved west, my Grandfather was convinced that he could keep the business going in the East and Midwest.

My Father disagreed, and once he was able to buy my grandfather's share of the firm, moved its headquarters to Miradero where I was born. This was 1895, and was 12 years old; I had spent almost all of my youth in Kansas City which, compared to Miradero, was "The Big City." Nevertheless, I found a home in what was left of the frontier. I was adopted, I suppose, by a wild Stallion whom I named Spirit. He would allow me to ride him almost every day.

I found my best friends to this day, Prudence Granger and Abigail Stone. The three of us were inseparable. I attended a one-room schoolhouse and my father fell in love with my teacher, Ms. Katherine Flores. The two were married a year after we arrived in Miradero. I was a good student; I had trouble with my attendance at first, but my grades were always outstanding.

As I advanced in school, I found myself becoming more and more drawn to academics, especially writing. I would write stories and essays. I found myself attracted to politics and I followed the 1896 election very closely. My Father, being a staunch Republican, supported William McKinley. Though unable to vote, I and my friends did as well. I would, in time, switch my party affiliation to Populist, Socialist, and eventually, to my Father's chagrin, Democratic, due to what my husband and I saw as Right-Wing Dominance of the Republican Party.

I also had a boyfriend, which is where the present story begins. My first love was a Mexican equine acrobat named Javier, who was two years my senior. He taught me horse tricks, and although he only visited Miradero infrequently, we fell in love. We rode together, danced together, shared our deepest secrets, and although, as a Christian Woman, I suppose I should be ashamed (I must admit that I cherish the experience though), we explored each other physically.

It was quite ironic that it was around this time that the man who would become my husband also came into my life. There were three churches in Miradero, The Episcopal Church, to which most of the Anglos went, and The Roman Catholic Church, to which most Mexicans went, and a small Baptist Church to which nearly all of the Blacks (including my friend, Pru, and her family) went. My Father converted to Roman Catholicism to marry my mother, and I was baptized a Roman Catholic; my teacher also, whom my father married, and who grew up in a convent orphanage was Catholic; they were the only two Anglos who were members of Our Lady of Guadalupe Parish; but we were hardly active. We did not attend mass weekly.

I mention the religious composition of the town by way of preface that around this time, St. Paul's Episcopal Church gained a new priest who came from Missouri; a young Reverend Thomas Ewls Halpert, only 27 years old, who had just returned from service in the Navy during the Philippine Campaign of the Spanish War. Like my father, he wanted to escape the carnage he witnessed. Unlike my father, it drove him into radical politics. Originally from a Republican family, Rev. Halpert rejected the Imperialism of he who had been his idol: Theodore Roosevelt.

Rev. Halpert and my father, though very different politically and religiously, shared a friendship over their love of the outdoors as well as their shared experience of War. I should say that I failed to mention that when the War with Spain came, my Father's desire to escape from his experience in the War of Southern Aggression, did not stop him from re-enlisting in the Army, and serving as an officer under Colonel Roosevelt in the Cuban Campaign.

One warm spring evening before a thunderstorm, Javier and I met to walk on the vista above the town. It was on the land of one Harlan Grayson who was, to say the least, very guarded of his property. It was also the most beautiful view in the region, so we dared ride there. It was here that Javier asked me to marry him that night. Without hesitation, I said "yes."

The storm caught up to us before we expected, and it suddenly became dark. We rode through the storm as quickly as we could. As we often did, we made a race of it. No horse could ever beat Spirit, though. I must have been hundreds of yards ahead of him when I heard a sudden burst of thunder strangely unaccompanied by lightning. I turned back, expecting to see Javier riding hard to catch up, but instead I saw only his horse, trotting at a slow pace. Suddenly terrified I rode back to find Javier lying on the ground.

Dismounting Spirit, I found Javier lying face-up in a puddle of his own blood, not breathing, the many holes in his torso revealing that he had been felled by a shotgun. I cried out as loudly as my lungs could sustain. I fell to my knees in the mud, taking his lifeless body into my arms, sobbing loudly, when I was approached from behind.

"I told you not to ride on my land," said Grayson. "I didn't know it was you two, I wouldn't have fire if I did, for all I knew you was… someone else!"

Grayson always hated me, I had no doubt that it mattered not whether he knew of our identity. I was convinced that he murdered Javier in cold blood. I shouted incoherent profanities at him. I charged at him, half expecting him to shoot me as well. Instead he dropped his shotgun and held me at arm's length.

Eventually I gave up and collapsed into a sobbing mess on the ground. I don't know how long I was there but I found that Grayson had returned with the Sheriff and my Father. By now the rain had stopped, and it was entirely dark outside. I immediatley demanded the sheriff arrest Grayson, but he said that Grayson had explained the whole matter on their return; that as it happened on Grayson's land, and as he was "reasonably fearful" for his life, no charges would be pressed.

My father gently took my hand

"Come on Lucky, it's time to go home," he said.

After the funeral mass, I laid in my room for days. Often Pru and Abigail would come to see me and we would sit in silence together.

My father eventually coaxed me out of my room, and I found some comfort riding Spirit alone. I would take long rides, sometimes we would stay out all night, sleeping in the desert.

I rode back to Miradero one morning to Pru and Abigail riding hard to meet me.

"Where were you?"

"I was out."

"Lucky, Grayson's dead, he was murdered."

I didn't react to the news, I simply rode home. Pru and Abigail followed me in silence. When I got home, Pru and Abigail asked if I wanted them to come in with me. Apologizing, I told them I wanted to be alone and went up to my room.

After about an hour there was a knock at the door. Quite annoyed, I nevertheless opened the door to find the sheriff at the entrance to my room with my Father.

"Lucky where were you last night."

"South of town, maybe a mile or so."

"What were you doing there?"

"Nothing."

"Nothing?"

"Spirit and I rode out to the desert, where we laid out, watching the stars."

There was an uncomfortable silence.

"You do know what has happened don't you?"

"Pru and Abigail told me."

"Lucky, were Pru and Abigail with you?" asked my father.

"No."

"So no one can corroborate your whereabouts?" asked the sheriff.

"Sheriff, I really don't think that Lucky would have had anything to do with this…"

"Harlan Grayson was stabbed repeatedly with a Frontier Fillies Knife that belonged to Abigail Stone, and we've verified her location at the time of the murder."

The numbness that I had been feeling suddenly turned to fear.

"I didn't…"

"Fortuna Prescott, you're under arrest for the murder of Harlan Grayson."

I was taken to the city jail where I would spend the next three weeks. The trial did not take long. I had no alibi.

"On the count of murder in the first degree, we the jury find the defendant, Fortuna Prescott, guilty as charged."

There was an audible gasp in the room. Abigail whom I could always count on to be funny was, in this case, deadly serious when she screamed "No!"

I began to shake. My mouth opened in dismay. A feeling of horror arose in my chest as I knew surely what would come next. I was ordered to stand before the bench. They asked me if I had anything to say. I professed my innocence but to no avail.

"Fortuna Esperanza Navarro Prescott, you have been found guilty of Murder in the First degree. Your youth does not excuse you, you know right from wrong, nor does what Mr. Grayson did to your friend, whether or not he was justified. Therefore, it is the sentence of this court, that you be taken to a place of execution, and hanged by the neck until you are dead. And may God have mercy on your soul."

With the bang of the gavel, I suddenly felt calmer, though I heard audible moans from those present in the courtroom. I suddenly felt a strange comfort in knowing that all hope was lost. There was nothing to be done but wait.

I was visited daily by Pru and Abigail who tried to keep my spirits up with feigned glee, talking about how our friends were doing, how Maricella and Turo's wedding plans proceeded; It honestly worked. I found myself joyfully distracted by my friends. Occasionally, however, we heard the knocking of hammers on nails constructing the instrument of my death outside the jail.

I slept surprisingly well the night before. I ate steak and eggs for breakfast around Seven in the Morning, after which the Mexican Priest came and administered Last Rites. Abigail and Pru came afterwards to give me a blue, summer dress to wear, and sit with me while we waited. About Nine-Thirty, the Sheriff informed me that it was time.

I'm afraid I have a lapse in memory beginning about this moment until I stood on the gallows. They tell me that I was very brave, though I am highly doubtful of that. Apparently I hugged Abigail and Pru, saying my goodbyes, I met my father on the way and hugged him tightly. I also bid farewell to my aunt, my stepmother, and my young brother and proceeded to ascend the gallows.

My memory revives with the feeling of the executioner gently nudging me forward onto the trap door by the small of my back, the noose that would end my life staring me down fearfully only inches away from my face. I noticed, at this point, that I was barefoot so my shoes must have been removed at some point after ascending the gallows. I don't remember if they asked me if I wanted to say any last words, and I certainly don't remember if I said any. I couldn't see anything except the coiled noose directly in front of me, I dared not look down into the crowd, for fear of seeing my friends and family crying.

I couldn't see, and I did not wish to see the preparations being made by the executioner. I suddenly felt the leather strap tied tightly around the skirt of my dress, binding my legs together at the knee. I remember the executioner gently, almost apologetically, even sweetly, taking my hands one-by-one and binding them behind my back with a thin piece of rope. I then saw a strand of the rope as it passed over my eyes, and felt it's thick, oily surface tighten around my neck.

"Please not the black bag!" I suddenly said in what I remember as a panicked voice, "please!"

My request was granted and my head remained uncovered.

It was at this point that I remember myself starting to shake uncontrollably as if I was cold. I drew short, panicked breaths; I don't think I was crying, but I was definitely panicking.

The Priest prayed but I don't remember what.

Without warning I suddenly felt nothing below my feet, and I had the terrible sensation of falling. The most horrible pain came over me as if I had been punched in the neck by a thousand-ton fist.

A sudden stillness came. For a moment I thought I was already dead. I am amazed that I was not immediately knocked unconscious, but the four-foot drop I was given was not nearly sufficient to break my neck, which was both a blessing and a curse. The stillness gave way to panic and a terrible pain. It was at once as if a knife was cutting into my neck and if I was being desperately choked. I was aware that I could not breathe though I tried furiously. Uncontrollably, my feet reached desperately for ground. Unable to find any, they kicked and kicked frantically, restrained only slightly by the strap around my skirt, almost as if I were running in place in midair.

I could see my surroundings but they did not register. I only knew the pain, the sensation of not being able to breathe, and the horribly loud, dreadful sound of rushing water in my ear; a sound that drowned out all other noise around me. I later found out that this was my blood constricted as it struggled to pass through the arteries near my ears.

Initially I didn't register the things in my view, but in an odd sort of Irony they came into focus for me precisely because I noticed them becoming blurry, and then gradually darker and darker until they disappeared into nothingness. The same moment the blackness overtook me, the pain was gone…

… It was gone, that is until a blinding light flashed into my vision. Air came violently into my lungs. I coughed and gagged hard through a sore throat that was worse than anything I could ever imagine. The white light suddenly gave way to the image of my father looking down upon me with tears of desperation in his eyes. I felt his arms wrap around my back as he lifted me to his chest in a tight embrace.

I began to notice that everything around me was Chaos. The rope around my neck was gone. The Doctor was pushing people out of the way to make it to my side. I had no idea why I had survived, and a terror suddenly came over me as I was afraid that perhaps the rope had broken and they were immediately going to put me back onto the Gallows and hang me again.

Nobody bothered to explain anything to me, after the doctor had examined me, and gave my father a mere nod and the exclamation, "she'll live," my father simply scooped me into his arms and carried me home. He put me onto the couch in our front parlor where I fell asleep.

When I woke up it was dark. The room was calm. Father and his wife were asleep in two respective easy chairs. Abigail was asleep on the floor next to the couch. Pru was pacing back and forth nervously while Reverend Halpert was tending the fire. Pru first noticed that I was awake, which somehow, without her saying a word, woke everyone else in the room up. They all rushed to my side, filling me with a slight feeling of being smothered.

I noticed that I could not speak, and that the pain in my neck was almost unbearable. Tears were streaking down my eyes because of it, and I was shaking, but I wasn't crying aloud. It seemed as if all of them asked me questions at once. I think I heard "are you alright?" "Does it hurt?" "Would you like some…"

I tried to answer but winced in pain; I could not talk.

"It's okay, Lucky," My father said. "Just rest. They found who actually murdered Grayson, it was Butch LaPray; you've been cleared."

I should have received this news with joy, but I simply nodded, still bawling. As someone was saying, "let's give her time to rest," I drifted off to sleep again.

Apparently Rev. Halpert took it upon himself to investigate the matter further. It seemed as if Grayson was quite genuine when he said that if he knew it was us he would not have fired. Word came to Grayson that Butch LaPray, whose imprisonment he was responsible for, had escaped. Grayson was terrified that LaPray would come after him, a terror that proved rational. This led Rev. Halpert, who, though only a Chaplain, had actually seen action during the Spanish War, to find LaPray himself. How he apprehended her is a matter for another story, but he somehow personally escorted her to Sacramento, securing a stay of execution which he arrived with only moments after the trap was sprung under my feet.

It was a miracle that the drop did not break my neck, and although this fact made my experience far more painful, it nevertheless saved my life.

LaPray was taken back to Miradero where she would hang in my place. I refused to attend the execution, but I was told that the drop broke her neck and she was spared the slow pain of strangulation that I experienced.

The Sheriff later told me that I hanged for only 11 seconds before I was cut down, but it seemed like much longer. It took three days before I could speak again, and even then, only in a whisper. The first time I looked in a mirror after the hanging, I noticed just how red my neck was, and it stayed that way for well over a month. The pain stayed with me for much longer, in fact I still feel it six years later. It may be psychological but not a day goes by where I do not feel the rope pressing against my throat.

I often dream about it. Sometimes I dream that everyone knows that I am innocent but they leave me hanging anyways. Sometimes I dream that I die and see my mother in heaven who died when I was very young. Sometimes I wake up and wonder if I did, in fact die on the gallows, and my life right now is merely a dream.

I've led a good life since my hanging. As good as one can in this world of sin. My experience has left me scarred and pained, but I am still thankful for the blessing of my happy life. I became an Episcopalian instead of a Roman Catholic and later fell in love with and married Rev. Halpert. Thus far we have not had any children, but we are not unwelcoming of the idea. I was one of the first women accepted to study Journalism at The University of California at Berkeley, and I even obtained a position as a lifestyle reporter and columnist for the Times in Los Angeles.

I and my husband have dedicated ourselves to the social causes: to the suffrage of women, the unionization of workers, opposition to Racism and Imperialism, and most dear to my heart, to the abolition of Capital Punishment.

Every human being is born in sin, no one stands justified before God, but in looking at the cross at Church, and in suffering the death throes of the condemned, I am left only with the impression that human life, even the life of the criminal, is precious to our creator, and that no one should ever have to suffer what I suffered.

Every time I read about the hanging of a criminal, the pain in my neck gets worse, almost as if a part of me is hanged with them. Perhaps a part of each of us dies whenever our society resorts to violence as a means of social control. As a Christian woman, violence of any kind is something I can no longer tolerate. Amen.


End file.
